Graboid Country
by randomplotbunny
Summary: Harry needs a change of pace. So he heads to a town called Perfection for a so-called Monster Tour just to pass the time, though he didn't expect so much difficulty just getting to the town.


_AN: There just are not enough Tremors FanFics out there, but there should be._

 _This takes place in the Tremors TV Series universe._

 _Warning for talk of snake religion. That is, the religious beliefs of snakes._

 **Disclaimer: I own neither Harry Potter or the Tremors franchises. I don't even own a Graboid figurine, and I really want one of those.**

 _§ parsletongue §_

Harry Potter, aka the Boy-Who-Lived, aka the Saviour-of-the-Wizarding-World, aka the Man-Who-Conquered, aka That-Bastard-Who-Left-My-Sister-At-The-Alter-All-Because-She'd-Been-Feeding-Him-Love-Potions-And-Then-Cut-Us-All-Off-From-Accessing-His-Vaults-That-Were-Rightfully-Ours-To-Use - that one was only ever used by Ron Weasley - aka the AWOL Saviour. Harry actually liked that last one, he felt he'd earned it after washing his hands of the British Wizardig World and taking off to explore what the rest of the World had to offer.

Harry Potter, the man of too many titles, as he liked to call himself, had been traveling the World and exploring new culters, learning new Magics and, most importantly, living his life the way he had always dreamed of doing: freely.

So here Harry was, just turned twenty-five, sitting in a bar in Los Vegas, Nevada and bored out of his mind. After visiting the ancient, yet still in use, Temples of El Dorado with their Pleasure Pits of Spiritual Enlightenment and Desire the flash and glame of Vegas just seemed... like a cheap knock off. So harry had found himself a quiet litte hole-in-the-wall bar to sit at, drink at and contemplate life at.

Maybe it was time he stopped moving around, he'd seen more of the World's wonders than most ever had by now. Maybe it was time he put down roots and tried to have that family he always wanted, albeit finding a partner that didn't want him for only his fame or money would be hard. Maybe he just needed a change, a new challenge...

A flashy flyer someone had left at the bar advertising monster tours caught his eye and put an end to his self-reflection. A quick look over the thing and Harry had a new destination to explore: He was going to Perfection!

GRABOIDGRABOIDGRABOIDGRABOIDGRABOID

Harry was flying down the dirt road leading to Perfection, Nevada- not really, though he wished he could get away with using his broom in such an open country- when his motorcycle's back tire blew out and he went skidding off the road for about fifty meters before finally getting it back under control and stopped.

After nearly falling off the now stationary bike, Harry lay on the sandy dirt for a few minutes to get his breath back and his rapidly beating heart under control before getting up to fix the tire. As he moved to stand he realized he was no longer alone as he heard a hissing voice nearby.

 _§ Food! Stay there food! You are going to get eaten! §_ Harry had no doubt that the voice meant for him to become their dinner, his luck just worked like that and he'd long since accepted it.

 _§ Not food! §_ Harry called out even though he couldn't see where the voice was coming from, though there was an odd disturbance in the dust that seemed to have been making a straight line directly at him as he'd been laying down.

Harry went wide-eyed when the ground, less that an arm's length in front of him, suddenly welled up and a huge worm like creature reared up. It was almost as big as he remembered the Basilisk being in his second year! And though it had no eyes Harry just knew it was looking at him.

 _§ Not food? §_ Before Harry could answer the question and confirm he wasn't food the creature opened its four pronged jaws and three long prehensile tongues, each with a mouth full of small yet curved teeth, snaked out and wrapped around him. _§_ _Food! §_

 _§ NOT. FOOD! §_ Along with his forceful reply Harry flexed his Magic and pushed the tongues, that had started trying to drag him into the waiting maw of the creature, off of him. Once the tongues had let go he sent a stinging hex after them for good measure, they were strong and he had no desire to see what the insides of the creature looked like.

The creature retracted its tongues, which seemed only slightly affected by the hex, closed its mouth and seemed to be confused- though Harry was only guessing, it was hard to read emotion off a creature that didn't have eyes or a face.

 _§ You taste like food. Only food tastes like food. How can you not be food when you taste like food? §_ Harry had to admit that that logic was sound, at least to a hungry animal. Now he just needed a way to convince it that he wasn't food. He might be able to fight the thing and win but he had no desire to kill the thing, especially as he had no idea what it was.

 _§ Foolish worm! Do you not recognize a Speaker when they speak to you?! §_ Harry jumped a little as a rather large rattle snake suddenly came to his defense, slithering up to perch on his downed bike for a better vantage point.

 _§ Speaker? What is a Speaker? Can I eat it? §_ The creature asked the snake, though not seeming to take its focus off of Harry.

 _§ A Speaker is a Two-Legger blessed by the Great World Serpent to know the True Tongue. They are to be protected- not eaten! To harm a Speaker is to bring the wrath of the Great World Snake down upon you, to protect one is to garner His blessings. §_ The rattle snake stated with conviction. Harry was fascinated, never having really spoken to many snakes, not having the desire to after the Basilisk and Nagini, but now wanting to know more of how snakes saw those humans who could communicate with them.

 _§ I am no mere ground crawler like you, why should I care about what your 'Great World Serpent' will do once I've eaten the Speaker? §_ Harry wanted to know too considering how determined the creature was that he would be its dinner. He hoped the consequences would be bad enough to discourage it, he had a feeling that he wouldn't be able to Apparate quickly enough to escape before it decided to attack. The quickness of its 'tasting' of him before gave him some idea of how quickly the thing could move if it wanted to.

 _§ It matters not if you believe or not, all those who speak the True Tongue belong to the Great World Serpent and will recieve His blessing or His condemnation regardless. So think before you attempt to anger the one who allows you to use the True Tongue at your leisure! §_ Harry breifly wondered if HE was under the purview of this Great World Serpent, it just might explain a lot.

The creature looked as if it were considering the concept the rattler had just introduced it to when its attention was suddenly pulled away towards the road- Harry could tell because it leaned that way and nearly crushed his bike and the snake perched on it.

With incredible speed- Harry now knew for certain that he wouldn't have been able to escape it before it could attack, it was much too fast for such a large creature that seemingly lived underground, and knew that if it had been serious about eating him he'd have already been dinner- the creature drew back into its tunnel and took off back into the desert.

 _§ Scary-Loud-Alpha is coming! §_ Was its parting call.

Harry looked down at the snake still on his bike.

 _§ Thank you for coming to my aid, I do believe you saved my life. §_ Harry smirked as the rattler wriggled and preened in pleasure at the praise.

 _§ It was my pleasure to protect a Speaker from an ignorant worm, Speaker. Now I must go, if the worm felt the crazy two legger approach then I don't want to be spotted. §_

 _§ Well, thank you again. §_ Harry called as the rattle snake slithered away and disappeared among the sparse vegetation on the ground.

A minute later and Harry finally heard the sound of an engine, a big one, heading his way.

GRABOIDGRABOIDGRABOIDGRABOIDGRABOID

Burt Gummer sat sipping his coffee as he watched the girls flutter around the tourist he'd rescued earlier that day, enchanted by his accent, as something about the whole situation churned in his gut, and he'd learned to trust his gut to tell him when something wasn't right. He was sure El Blanco had been not just near where the tourist- Harry Evans, but please call me Harry- had been but nearly right on top of him, or under him as the case may be. It just didn't make any since that the young man was still alive, and Burt didn't like things not making since.

Harry was sat on a stool and having a lovely lunch at Chang's, the obvious central hub of activity in the small town of Perfection, as the ladies of the town interrogated him for gossip- or just to hear his voice, maybe; he'd found that most Americans were drawn to his accent, he just didn't understand why- after filling him in on just why the town was famous.

Considering the way he had been grabbed earlier Harry could appreciate why they were called Graboids.

Just as he was explaining to his attentive audience the differences in experiences he'd had while seeing the Egyptian Pyramids up close verses seeing the Myan ones- though he couldn't tell them that many Magicals still worshipped at the Myan ones, or that he'd had the honor of taking part in one of the Solstice celebrations there- a car pulled up outside the shop and two men in non-desert friendly suits got out.

"Gummer. Ladies." The older man, Agent Twichell, greeted pleasantly enough, having finally managed a bit of mutual respect with the small population of Perfection, before the eyes of his younger companion- a rookie agent newly assigned to help him manage the oddities of Perfection and whom he'd brought down to introduce to everyone- landed on the new face at the counter and froze.

Burt looked between the frozen goverment agent and the resigned looking 'tourist' and his suspicious nature amped up to eleven. But before he could draw his sidearm and demand to know who this 'Harry' really was a very unmanly squeal left the lips of the, no longer frozen, agent at the door.

"You're Harry Potter!" The rookie exclaimed in excitement, never having thought he'd get a chance to meet the most powerful Wizard in the World face to face. "I've read all about you and how you defeated the Dark Lord Voldemort and his group of fanatical followers! Can I have your autograph?!" Harry just turned away from the agent and laid his head in his arms on the counter top with a groan. The younger agent looked to his boss for some help. "Did I say something wrong?"

Twichell just glared at his subordinate. Being a Squib he knew who Harry Potter was, and more he knew that the famous hero had left the Wizarding World to avoid such reactions as he just got- the hero had been very frank in his final ever interview while listing out all the reasons he never planned to return to the Magical Community.

Burt looked at the young man, the very young man, at the counter and wondered who the 'Dark Lord Voldemort' was and how young the kid had to have been when he 'defeated' him. Sounded like a case of Children Soldiers to him and he didn't like it, and he didn't yet have all the facts either!

"I don't think he likes his fame, kid." Burt answered the kid seeing as it didn't look like Twich would. "What is he famous for anyway?" Burt asked the older agent. The ladies, who were silently comforting Harry who was refusing to lift his head up, openly listened to the conversation at the door, they wanted to know what was going on too.

The low ranking Wizard was too excited about meeting The Harry Potter to worry about being in a room full of non-Magicals as he launched into his tale, completely cutting off his boss' "Classified."

"Harry Potter's earliest claim to fame was when he was fifteen months old! It was Holloween, and both his parents had just been killed by the most evil man alive, but he still somehow managed to defeat the Dark Lord from right in his crib." Burt held back a snort, that sounded like a load of PR bull if he ever heard of any.

Nancy rubbed the young man's back in sympathy, it couldn't have been easy being famous for living because your parents died and you didn't.

"Everyone thought the Dark Lord was dead, but he and his supporters kept coming back and Harry Potter stood up to them everytime and fought them back!" Twichell rubbed his hands over his face and wondered if they were even still teaching about the Statute of Secrecy anymore or if this kid was just plain stupid.

"Then when he was seventeen he lead an army to fight the Dark Lord's army and killed the man for good in front of everyone! He is the Boy-Who-Lived, the Man-Who-Conquered!" Jodi thought it was disgusting that a seventeen year old had been made to lead a war. Weren't there adults that should have been protecting him?

The young agent, completely oblivious to all the dirty looks he was getting, asked for Harry's autograph once again; and then looked surprised when the famous hero got up and stalked past him into the street. He followed after, he really wanted that autograph as no one would believe he'd met The Harry Potter otherwise, so didn't hear the seismic-watches going off to indicate that El Blanco was nearby.

"It's just an autograph! Come on! I'll even pay you!" Harry finally snapped and rounded on the man.

"Pay me?! I wouldn't give you an autograph if you begged me! It is people like you that drove me away in the first place! Why can't you peolple get it through your thick skulls to just _leave me alone!_ " Neither man noticed as those inside signaled for them to be quiet, or how the fence just down the street trembled as something passed by underneath it.

"But you are a hero! A treasure for the people to revere!" Harry thought he heard a quietly hissed 'Loud food is easy food' but couldn't be sure as the agent who had started this whole mess was still yelling. "You lost your right to privacy the moment you became famous, just accept it and get over it! You-!" Whatever else the man was about to say was lost as El Blanco suddenly lunged from underground and swallowed the agent down.

Harry stayed frozen, not having expected this turn of events.

 _§ Speaker, the loud food was good. Is there more? §_ Harry was a bit relieved that it seemed the Graboid had decided he wasn't to be eaten, but was a little put off by the casual murder it had just committed. But best to be polite to the giant killer worm.

 _§ No, I'm sorry but there isn't. §_ If a featureless worm could look disappointed then this one did.

 _§ Too bad. Loud food is always the easiest to find, and the tastiest. §_ El Blanco then slid back into his hole and left as abruptly as he came.

"So you can talk to Graboids, huh?" Harry jumped a bit at the voice suddenly cutting through the silence and looked over to see that he'd had an audience for his little chat.

"Uh... Yes?" Harry really hoped this wasn't about to become a repeat of his second year, or worse, having people wanting to study his ability.

GRABOIDGRABOIDGRABOIDGRABOIDGRABOID

Harry sat on the porch of the newly built saloon style inn, directly across from Chang's, that he now owned and ran- just six rooms, and hardly ever used, but it was all he wanted- and watched as Tyler's latest tour group got happily off the jeep and filed into the store for souvenirs. He hadn't been able to convince El Blanco to stop eating people- apparently people were tastly, especially the loud ones- but he had convinced him to approach the tour jeep more often without attcking.

And if he had done so with a lot of praise of his amazing deadliness and the suggestion that some of the loud food may fall off their safe transport in their excitement at seeing him and be free and easy pickings? Well, that was between him and the Graboid.

"Harry." Perfection's resident survivalist greeted as he joined the younger man in his people watching.

"Burt" Harry greeted in return.

"You wouldn't happen to know why Rosalita's ranch has been overrun with snakes lately, now would you?" The older man asked casually. Harry just gave him an innocent grin.

"I can not be held responsible for the actions of wild animals, Burt. Maybe they just like it over there?" Bert snorted at the blatant lie and Harry's grin became a smirk.

"So it has nothing to do with her recent attempt to sell information about you to that reporter?" The older man pressed.

"Come on now, Burt, would I do something like set a valley's worth of snakes on a woman who is deathly afraid of snakes just to get back at her for violating my privacy in a petty attempt at revenge just because I wouldn't date her?"

"Yes." Harry couldn't help but chuckle at the older man's deadpan delivery.

"Well... if it makes you feel any better I didn't tell El Blanco about what happened." The Graboid had fully embraced the idea of the Great World Serpent and had taken to protecting Harry, the only Speaker he knew, with a murderous passion. A tourist had once gotten a bit mouthy with Harry and ended up Graboid food before he'd left even reached his car.

Harry tried not to interact with too many of the tourists anymore, it would scare away business if that sort of thing became a regular occurrence.

The only consolation anyone had was that the Graboid had agreed to leave Harry's friends, meaning the other full time residents of Perfection, alone. Unless Harry said otherwise, of course, but Harry had kept that part to himself. El Blanco _really_ wanted to eat Burt, and tried to convince Harry to let him at least once a week.

"That's a small miracle. Any chance you'll call them off her? She's apparently refusing to leave her house now." Harry grimaced, not liking having terrorized the woman but hoping that she had learned not to try taking such petty revenge when she didn't get her way.

"Yeah, I'll talk to them later." Burt nodded and went to say something else, but before he could their seismic-watches went off as El Blanco came into town, making a beeline for the inn and Harry. A Notice-Me-Not charm kept the lingering tourists from noticing the Graboid as it reared up out of the dirt.

 _§ Speaker. §_

 _§ El Blanco. §_ The Graboid had been confused by the concept of having a name but had soon embraced it, and wanted Harry to say it as often as possible. It had even demanded lessons in human speech so it could recognize its name while spoken by humans just so it could hear it more often.

 _§ You said to come tell you if a little food got separated from its big food and not to eat it, so I didn't eat it and came and got you. §_ Harry frowned as he translated what the Graboid had just told him. It had never taken to calling humans anything but food, and 'little food' was its way of addressing a child...

 _§ And where is this 'little food' now? §_ Harry demanded as he sat forward intently, needing to know where the hild was so it could be rescued.

Burt frowned and sat forward as he noticed the younger man get suddenly serious. It had taken him a long while to be even marginally at ease aroud the Graboid, and only when Harry was there to act as translator and buffer, and wondered what had happened to cause the sudden tension he felt radiating off the other man.

 _§ Near the Scary-Loud-Alpha's burrow. §_ Harry turned towards his companion and told him what he'd just learned. With a curse Burt was up and running for his truck.

El Blanco followed Scary-Loud-Alpha's movements until he was well away, dissapointed that he had promised to not eat him. He'd been looking forward to eating Scary-Loud-Alpha for a long time.

 _§ And do you know where the little food's big food went? §_ The Graboid tossed its head before sinking back down into its hole to leave, its message delivered.

 _§ No, only the little food was there. §_ Harry frowned at the retreating dust trail, glad that the Graboid had come to him with the news like he'd been asked to do but upset that it had been necessary at all.

Later that evening, after the child had been found and rescued, the parents- two people who had gone on the tour after dumping their child in a Graboid hunting territory- had been arrested and all the excitement had died down, Harry sat again on his porch and looked up at the vast array of stars above the town, a sight that could not be seen in cities...

He'd finally put down roots, settled in a place that appreciated him for himself and not his fame, and had created a family of sorts out of the rag tag group that called this dangerous place their home...

This was Perfection, Harry thought, in every sense of the word.


End file.
